


Euterpe

by Aloice



Series: jayceofpiltover tumblr drabble collection [4]
Category: League of Legends
Genre: F/M, Gen, Terminal Illnesses, implied Jayce/Sona, old leagueverse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-24
Updated: 2017-11-24
Packaged: 2019-02-06 03:49:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,487
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12808965
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aloice/pseuds/Aloice
Summary: A futile struggle to maintain the only negative pressure differential that matters.That fragile stream of moving air.Written to Youtube user horizon's version of Euterpe.





	Euterpe

**Author's Note:**

> Originally published in April 2015 partially for tumblr user ladybuvelle.

> _As my mind wanders further down memory lane, I realize that I miss the feeling of falling in love. Of falling unexpectedly and freely into something unknown. Of endless possibilities filled with hope and nerves. Of good things that I let go._

- Lila Wolfe, “You’re Hard to Forget Even When I’m Over You”

 

When did it start?

Was it the spring that ended too early, the dandelions that withered unexpectedly in the garden, or the first hesitations in your steps as you walked home, that trembling of the coffee cup-holding hand?

You spread out your palms before your eyes and gazed down at your lifelines in the cold breeze, the valleys marked by the stars. Those were a scientist’s hands, a mechanic’s beloved tools, a poet’s instrument. When you talked about love it was always about hands to hold. When you talked about tomorrow it was always about hands to support, create, build.

There was a weakness in your right hand.

You stared at it - remembered the Hammer that grew too heavy and all those moments of unwillingly letting go - and was suddenly afraid.

A light kiss, tracing over your own fingers, almost as a salute on the dance floor. 

 _Ave atque vale_. Hail and goodbye.

 

“Are you alright?” Heimerdinger asked a week after that, calling from the other end of the lab as you struggled to pick yourself up from the ground. You had landed in a mess of glassware - you could feel the pieces slice across your skin, blood splattered on the ground - but the dizziness was subsiding and the world was no longer spinning and you were no longer seeing the galaxy in front of your eyes. You felt yourself sprawl out, lying still in what was probably a pool of your own blood, waiting patiently for the world to return. Counting the seconds. Counting the number of red letters on your last physical report, something you immediately requested to keep private.

Counting each breath.

_I was expecting this._

A lie; so you kicked using what remained of the strength in your right leg, imagining yourself in Full Metal armor, holding the Mercury Cannon high as you stood on top of the world, eyes mirror bright above the Spire.

Tears. Tears as you heard the yordle slowly walk over, imagined all the work in the city you wouldn’t live long enough to see.

_I was not expecting this._

 

Denial was in staring Caitlyn down when they put in the IV, refusing to talk to her about your condition even as she took an entire day off for a long visit. Denial was in never taking more morphine than absolutely necessary, clinging onto the integrity of your mind, a wish to not be addicted to anything more than engineering caffeine. Denial was in challenging Vi to an arm wrestling match even as the world started to dissolve. Denial was promises to the heart, all the bites out of food that had long lost its taste, frantic nightly readings of all the Ionian poems you never had time to go over.

Denial was a Defender trying to repair all the holes in a sinking vessel.

Denial was looking outside your sickroom window and staring wistfully at the baby sparrows.

Denial was in trying to stand up when you heard the clock toll midnight, because you didn’t want to go out lying down.

 

It became apparent that you weren’t going to leave the room anytime soon, so: the Hammer by the bed. A screen above those ever-hazy eyes. A small pot of flowers just inside of your reach, a sweet fragrance to pretend.

You recorded several decades’ worth of messages for your friends before you lost your voice.

Sona visited, so: listen. Smile as she spoke of your heartbeat as a symphony, brainstorm about all the things you could do together once you got better. A night under the stars. A day to feed the ducklings. You blinked towards the machine:  _Thanks, Maven_. She faltered and insisted again that you call her by her first name.  _Only when it’s the last time._

Caitlyn was as dumbfounded as you were, so: resist. Cooperate with her as she tries to get you through your exercises, squint at your lab reports to try to find some good news between the lines. Give her lyrics for her to sing, stories to encourage the other patients in the ward. One night she broke down and asked the question why. You whispered  _Never Say Goodbye_.

Vi was angry, so: dream. Pretend that everything was just a nightmare, even as your heart hurt from all the times shock blasts were used on the wrong person. Run your fingers through her hair even if you can’t feel them anymore, lift those dead hands to punch through the paper she held up in the air. It took you way too many tries.  _I’ll try again._

Ezreal understood too much, so: watch. Feel the distance stretch out between identical shades of blue eyes, a vacuum between silence and the empyrean. Cling onto him even as both of you withdrew from each other, knowing that it was only the nature of the universe for things to fall and break apart. Your journey wasn’t his.  _Scatter the ashes._

Heimerdinger was wise, so: cry. Let yourself become a child again when he chanted to you again the laws of the world that would never change, the beauty in the land and sea that gave birth to the wings of the butterflies and the harmony of the pendulum. Hold your breath as he wiped away your tears, begged you to forgive him for not teaching you how to live.  _It’ll be alright._

 

Pain came in waves, periods when color and touch were stripped away and you were left in the utter mercy of a malfunctioning machine, the one thing that you couldn’t either replace or fix. It hurt. It hurt and it wouldn’t end. It hurt and nothing existed beyond the hurt, hurt demanding conservation of hurt in itself, the supreme God of all things that were hurting.

And then it would get a little better and you would try to deeply breathe in and out to give yourself some solace, only to realize breathing was also a luxury, something that wasn’t yours to keep.

_Never look back._

Looking back hurt too much.

You were trying your damn hardest to pave the longest fucking way to hell.

 

You wanted to cry for a long time after they brought you back for the third time and you could no longer remember the laws of low Reynold flows or the meter of Catullus. But you couldn’t. The ventilation system was quite fragile and not built to handle human emotion. Whoever built it was probably a failure of a scientist.

So what was left was only one sentence, something said by both astronauts and novelists, something held close to the soul like a gospel, the one thing to repeat to oneself in panic and bravery when all else had fallen away.

_Do not go gentle into that good night._

 

A coma is drowning in slow motion.

Try: being locked and imprisoned under water, suffocating without even the comfort of flailing limbs and filling lungs. Water pressure is some huge number. There’s no bottom to the ocean of death.

Try: holding onto life with the strength of only a labored breath, each inhalation like a whisper, each oxygen molecule the manna of God. You can’t really blame your alveoli. They’re suffering a lot more than you.

Try: wandering in an endless darkness, wading with only the memories of the summer morning light. How does one even  _wade_? You sure as hell haven’t really moved in more than a few days.

Try: regretting not actually saying goodbye. Regretting not trying harder.

Try: being really, really scared of the future, for once.

What is a song? A collection of notes - discrete frequencies - waves propagating through the air. An aria. A requiem. Music that could and have stirred millions of souls, the one hope that lingered even through those most impossible goodbyes. Wonder given substance, disturbances through the air, the destroyer of this final silence…

And she’s playing for him, matching the rhythm to your QRS.

A doomed melody.

 _Yes, good_ , you think to yourself, smiling despite the pain and the finality.  _Haunt me._

_Maybe in a different world where you could reach the end and I could bolt into the tenor, the story could reach its conclusion._

_All these missing sounds and premature stops. Oh, to think how beautiful it could have been._

So you play your life back to her through the waves, weaving a poem into every tremble through the chambers and ventricles, charging through the blocks as your heartbeat soars and falls into a deafening silence, running head first into the next world as the curtain falls.

_Maybe I’ll have better luck next time._


End file.
